Resisting the Truth
By every known law of the mind, conversion must be effected by the influence of the truth on the mind. Every time you resist the truth the next time you hear it, it loses its force on your mind. And every time you hear a truth and withstand it, then you become stronger in your power to resist the truth. We all know this, that each resistance strengthens you against the truth. When a man hears the truth and he resists it, the truth grows weaker and he grows stronger to resist it.
No matter what Jesus Christ did the Jews refused to believe. He had performed wonderful deeds but they wouldn't believe, so when Lazarus was dead, he said: "Lazarus, come forth," and then turned to the Jews and said: "Isn't that evidence enough that I am the Son of God?" and they cried: "Away with him." One day he was walking down the hot dusty road and he met a funeral procession. The mourners were bearing the body of a young man and his mother was weeping. He told them to place the coffin on the ground and said:
"Young man arise," and he arose. Then he asked the Pharisees: "Is that not proof enough that I am the Son of God, that I make the dead to arise?" and they cried: "Away with him." So no matter what Jesus did, the Jews refused to believe him. No matter what Jesus Christ says or does today, you'll refuse to accept, and continue to rush pell-mell to eternal damnation.
"Too Late"
Jesus Christ gives you just as much evidence today. Down in Indiana, my friend, Mrs. Robinson, was preaching. I don't remember the town, but I think it was Kokomo, and I remember the incident, and the last day she tried to get the leader of society there to give her heart to God. She preached and then went down in the aisle and talked to her. Then she went back to the platform and made her appeal from there. Again she went to the girl, but she still refused. As Mrs. Robinson turned to go she saw her borrow a pencil from her escort and write something in the back of a hymn book.
A few years afterward Mrs. Robinson went back to the town and was told the girl was dying. They told her the physicians had just held a consultation and said she could not live until night. Mrs. Robinson hurried to her home. The girl looked up, recognized her and said: "I didn't send for you. You came on your own account, and you're too late." To every appeal she would reply: "You're too late." Finally she said: "Go look in the hymn book in the church."
They hurried to the church and looked over the hymn books and found in the back of one her name and address and these words, "I'll run the risk; I'll take my chance." That was the last call to her. Not any one sin is the unpardonable sin, but it may be that constant repetition, over and over again until God will say: "Take it and go to hell."
Who can commit it? I used to think that only the vile, the profane were the people who could commit it.
Whom did Jesus warn? The Pharisees. And who were they? The best men, morally, in Jerusalem.